The 6 Most Pointlessly Elaborate Movie Murder Plots

When you really need something done, the simplest method is almost always the best.

But don't tell that to Hollywood bad guys, who can't seem to kill a single victim without planning out a complex, Rube Goldberg-style sequence that's almost sure to end in failure.

So, we get criminal masterminds using methods like...

#6. Stuntman Mike's Stunt Car in Death Proof

Stuntman Mike, from Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's ambitious bomb Grindhouse, seduces beautiful women who have nothing better to do but hang out in hole-in-the-wall bars in Middle of Nowhere, Texas.

Then he kills them, either by giving them a ride in the front seat of his stunt car (the driver seat is "death proof" but the rest of the car isn't) and crashing it, or just running them off the road.

The Problem:

Every plan results in his own car getting bashed to pieces. That means every time he scores a kill, he has to come back and rebuild the engine, put in a new suspension, get new brakes, shocks, axles, rebuild the transmission and who knows what else. All of this is after he's released from the hospital, of course.

But that doesn't touch on the most obvious problem: his insurance premiums. We don't even think Geico is going to be all that understanding after about the 12th woman turns up dead in one of his "accidents." Prepare for some skeptical looks from the claims guy, Mike.

A Better Way:

He convinces the drunken hotties to give him a lap dance to some R&B tunes, and then shoots them in the face.

#5. The Cube in Cube

If you haven't seen this cult classic, basically it's Saw, except it doesn't involve a saw. It involves a cube.

A group of random people find themselves trapped in a cube-shaped maze, with no memory of how they got there. As the team moves through the cube, they find that some rooms are safe and some are booby trapped.

One room sprays acid on its victims, another one has retractable spikes, another juliennes its victims with cheese wire.

The Problem:

In order to truly understand a murder plot, it's important to understand the motive. And, after watching the entire movie, there doesn't seem to be any. The creation or creator of the Cube is never explained, and neither is the reason for these particular people being trapped there. In other words, the message is that life's a bitch and then you get a face full of acid.

"Is this one of the retarded acid cubes or one of the regular retarded cubes?"

But let's just assume for the sake of argument that the Cube's creator intended to teach people how to work together by putting them in a situation they could only escape from by pooling their resources, skills and knowledge. Wouldn't it be simpler and cheaper to just send them to a team-building weekend in the woods where they could learn the same things by crossing rope ladders and solving toothpick puzzles?

"Let's make this bigger. And with acid."

And if that is indeed the lesson, how are they going to spread their message when they are all dead and the only guy who makes it out alive is the one with autism?

A Better Way:

The Cube's creator points a gun in the face of his victims and tells them to "Cooperate, dammit!" Then he shoots all of them, minus the autistic one, in the face.

#4. The Remote-Controlled Car Bomb in The Dead Pool

The Dirty Harry series officially ran out of steam by the fourth film in the franchise, and then it jumped the shark in a remote control car.

In The Dead Pool, a serial killer is once again stalking the streets of San Francisco, killing people to rig a "dead pool" (a betting pool on what famous person will die next). Dirty Harry Callahan is on the list and the killer decides the best way to off the 60-year-old man is by going after him with an explosive radio controlled car.

Unfortunately, the killer doesn't realize that Dirty Harry's actual car can out run the radio controlled car, so a chase ensues with Dirty Harry's car, the killer's car and the killer's tiny RC car, which he is controlling with perfect ease while driving his own, full-sized vehicle. Think of it as Bullitt if it were written by a small, confused child.

The Problem:

Just think about the amount of time that had to go into making a remote controlled car-bomb, and somehow making that car run fast enough to nearly keep up with a real car. Then at the end of all that effort, you still have a device that can be thwarted by something as simple as a curb or a small dog.

A Better Way:

Show Dirty Harry your ridiculous killer remote control car. While he's distracted by his derisive laughter, shoot him in the face.